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Quotable and notable
???It's still based on narrow, do-or-die, high-stakes tests, where some kids win and some kids lose.??? ???Dennis Van Roekel, President, National Education Association
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Are "common standards" good for American education?
For five good reasons, conservatives should take seriously the potential of the newly released (in draft form) “common” education standards to strengthen U.S. education.
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Big bang theory
There’s a new show in town, and it’s called “Arne Get Your…27 Shotguns.” That’s reportedly what the Education Department is purchasing to replace old firearms used by its Inspector General. Well, well, well. This gives a whole new meaning to “bullet points.” Silver bullets, anyone? And Race to the Top finalists had better bring their armor.
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Poor in spirit
Americans are richer than ever, yet no happier than in the early 1970s. So Richard Bok asserts in The Politics of Happiness: What Government Can Learn from the New Research on Well-Being. In this longish New Yorker piece, Elizabeth Kolbert reviews the latest research on being happy--and the news is anything but.
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Saving America's Urban Catholic Schools
Stephanie Saroki and Christopher LevenickPhilanthropy RoundtableDecember 2009
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Teaching Talent: A Visionary Framework for Human Capital in Education
Rachel E. Curtis and Judy Wetzel (eds.)Harvard Education PressMarch 2010
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Detroit, the city with a plan
Detroit on the up-and-up? Its leaders have a plan to pick their schools up by their bootstraps--two plans in fact.
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Hail to the Kansas City chief
More right-sizing in the Midwest. Last week, at the urging of its superintendent, John Covington, the Kansas City (Missouri) school board made the gutsy decision to close nearly half its schools.
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Sayonara SES and choice, redux
15 months ago, we proposed dropping the supplemental educational services and public school choice programs from No Child Left Behind.
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Fantastic RTT teacher section from Florida
There are lots of very interesting and very exciting elements in the teacher section of Florida's RTT application. First, this is a startling admission:
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Major concerns raised by Georgia
In this report from several months ago, I predicted, with worry, that some state RTT applications would appear on the surface to be gung-ho reform, but when layers were peeled back, the state's commitment would come into question.
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Quotable and notable
"Right now, we're just focusing on what's easy, what can be developed quickly, because it's going to take a lot of trial and error to find out what is the best practice for doing this." ??? Joy Smith, Chief Development Officer, Florida Virtual School
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Education news nuggets
While some bloggers don't know what to make of the administration's education rhetoric, everyone agrees that NCAA
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10 questions for Race to the Top finalists
Race to the Top finalists are starting to make their presentations today. As a service to the U.S.
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The Blueprint and Congress
Tomorrow, Secretary Duncan appears before the House Education and Labor Committee to discuss the administration's ESEA reauthorization blueprint.
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Oh-oh
In its RTT application, Delaware misspells its own name: "Deleware." Worse, it's in the section that boasts the state's fantastic system for evaluating teachers based on improving student learning. --Andy Smarick Update: Kudos to the two careful readers who caught my mistake. Serves me right for being snide. I've learned my lesson.
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Maine's opposition to RTT
Maine's legislature recently held hearings on several reform bills that would make the state more competitive in the Race to the Top. Here are some highlights from an article in the Kennebec Journal:
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Five reasons conservatives should support common education standards
Just why are the Common Core standards good for American education? In today's National Review Online, Checker Finn comes up with five good reasons, starting with this one:
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Quotable and notable
???If you're going to have true accountability, it needs to rest with a single evaluator.??? ???Judith Perez, President, Associated Administrators of Los Angeles
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Goodbye school accountability, hello teacher accountability
The last 36 hours have left me puzzled as to why the teachers unions aren't declaring victory.
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Quotable and notable
"You can't say we're going to get all kids college ready and ignore 85% of the schools." ??? Amy Wilkins, Vice President, Education Trust
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ESEA proposal:A blind man's elephant the GOP should embrace
It's official: Arne Duncan has fulfilled his promise to propose a reauthorized No Child Left Behind law that is "tight" about the results expected while "loose" on the means.
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Brooks: Obama is "the most determined education reformer in the modern presidency"
Today's David Brooks column is worth reading; he sizes up President Obama and argues that he's "a center-left pragmatic reformer."
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A "reform realist's" guide to ESEA reauthorization
[caption id="" align="alignleft" width="469" caption="Caption: Too tight - like some recent education reform proposals."][/caption]
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Sector agnosticism in Detroit
The last time I wrote about "sector agnosticism" (in a post about Denver), I got lots of supportive emails. The concept is simple and seems to resonate with people: stop focusing on and fighting about who runs a school (i.e.