Though I am not inclined to give teachers too much autonomy until they start showing signs of it working to improve our schools, Jonathan Zimmerman raises some interesting issues in his When Teachers Talk out of School essay in this morning's Times.
As the summer (and Facebook) heats up, don't let your hair get cymotrichous. Follow
Scared of getting blackmailed by your students? Relax and get started on your summer reading - and remember, things could be worse!
There has been the ?silver bullet? debate, the ?secret sauce? battle, the ?demonize teacher? tirades, and the ?cracking the code? kerfuffle over Waiting for Superman. Now, according to Diane Ravitch, it's the miracle workers perfidy. Sinners, get ye to your rosary beads ? and fast!
??overweight women were less likely to earn college degrees ? regardless of their ability, professional goals or socioeconomic status. In other words, it didn't matter how talented or ambitious they were, or how well they had done in high school.''
The other night, during one of our marathon budget workshops, we heard from a woman who had started a ?walking school bus? pilot program in one of our schools.? It's part of an anti-obesity grant and she had a wealth of information about the benefits of walking to school. She warned, ?We are raising a generation of kids who are afraid to walk.??
School really can be fun! The spelling bee season has kicked off in full force.
Louis Menand offers opposing views of college in the latest New Yorker. On the one hand, he writes, college is basically ?a four-year intelligence test. Students have to demonstrate intellectual ability over time and across a range of subjects.
Diane Ravitch's latest piece in the New York Times contains some fine, necessary instruction to which many in the education-policy world might listen: stop creating education miracles.
Jonathan Franzen gave a commencement address at Kenyon College a few days ago and the New York Times published part of it in the newspaper. Many of us operate in a constant whirl of cheap information and to read Franzen's words is to be smacked in the face, reminded of it.
Mike and Rick talk substantively (for a change) about: Clark County's education blueprint, private special-education service providers, and utopian hopes for turnarounds. Amber geeks out with stats from the latest Condition of Education and Chris audibles for a Texas high school football stadium. [powerpress]
?If school districts are not willing to work collaboratively to eradicate the vestiges of de jure segregated schools, we will ask the courts to take the steps necessary to ensure that students of all racial backgrounds have the opportunity to attend diverse, inclusive schools.?
A friend emailed this morning:? ?Breathtaking."? It was the first of many such emails and phone calls.
?My students have just as much potential as every other student in the country, regardless of what ZIP code they were born into, regardless of what social-economic level they were born into'' *
The Times' Room for Debate blog tackles teacher evaluations today, in particular the news that New York City plans to introduce a dozen new tests in order to gather data for said evaluations.
?For me, it's personal. I see my parents in those Compton parents. Now I can do something about the injustice, the denial of opportunity, the idea that it's OK for some kids not to read.'' *
Our recent study on trends in the special education population was only able to get at the costs of special ed obliquely.
The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here
It's the start of the holiday weekend, so I'll give you the bad news first?1. There is now a fellowship that pays students to drop out, 2.
In this week's Atlantic, Gagan Biyani, cofounder of Udemy (a web start-up that provides a platform for anyone in the world to build their own online course with video, virtual-classroom sessions, etc.), said:
The US Department of Education has hired a new director of its Federal Charter Schools Program, which oversees a variety of grant programs for starting and replicating public charter schools, as well as credit enhancements to help them afford high-quality facilities.
William Damon, professor of education at Stanford and a Hoover Institution fellow, has written a book, Failing Liberty 101, about young Americans' ignorance or eschewal of civic virtue and the extreme danger for the United States such disregard engenders. The threat of an uneducated citizenry, writes Damon, is ?a threat far more serious than any foreign enemy could ever pose?
?There's no question that the quality of our teachers is at the highest level it has ever been. Now, Alabama is one step closer to having a tenure law that is as professional as our teachers.'' *
Mike's back in the saddle; he and Janie fire off points on international comparisons and testing-for-evaluation in L.A. and NYC. Amber shoots holes in a new ACT study and Chris exercises his first amendment rights.[powerpress]
?But the truth is, arguing against testing for kids with disabilities is discriminatory.'' * ?Michelle Rhee, CEO and Founder of StudentsFirst
